The summer months make me think of making home-made ice cream, which can be a real treat. I will highlight several styles of ice cream that can be made at home, ranging from simple to more complex. The great thing is that even the simple ones are really good, made with fresh ingredients, and so much better than store-bought.

Typically, a flavored ice cream base is made and then chilled and then churned in a pre-frozen ice cream maker. The churning allows for the formation of tiny ice crystals and pockets of air surrounded by thick, concentrated cream, leading to the smooth and creamy texture associated with ice cream. There are many types of ice cream makers out there. I own an ice cream maker attachment for my KitchenAid Mixer. The bowl is pre-chilled in the freezer overnight and then a plastic dasher attaches to the mixer to churn the ice cream. I have also used stand-alone ice cream makers, such as the Cuisinart Ice Cream Maker. With the Cuisinart there is a bowl that is placed in the freezer, and then the bowl is rotated within the machine to churn the ice cream. After churning, the ice cream is then placed in the freezer to harden for a couple hours.

There are many types of ice cream bases. The traditional French custard ice cream base is made with egg yolks and heavy cream that are whisked together over low heat to make a thickened custard. However, this is a bit of a pain, because you end up with a lot of leftover egg whites (which can be used in a meringue or in an egg-white omelette), and heating the custard so that the eggs don’t cook quickly and become scrambled requires a lot of attention. A great example of a French vanilla ice cream made with this type of base can be found in Suzanne Goin’s Sunday Suppers at Lucques cookbook. This goes great with tangerine or tangelo juice to make a creamsicle with candied orange sugar cookies. (You can cheat and buy vanilla ice cream, but where’s the fun in that?)

However, a super-easy ice cream to start out with is No-Cook Strawberry Ice Cream, from Gourmet magazine. As the name implies, there is no cooking of a traditional custard ice cream base. Instead, mashed strawberries, a little bit of lemon juice, sugar, salt, and heavy cream form the base, half of which is pureed in a blender to smoothen, and the entire mix is then spun in the ice cream maker. Really easy and really delicious fresh strawberry flavor.

A bit more difficult is Sour Cream Ice Cream, also from Gourmet magazine. It might sound strange, but the tartness of the sour cream works really well as an ice cream flavor. This one does require making a cream and egg yolk custard. The Sour Cream Ice Cream goes wonderfully with Honey Caramel Peach Pie.

A little bit more complex ice cream, but one that does not require egg yolks is Sweet Corn and Black Raspberry Ice Cream. I first saw this published in The New York Times as an excerpt from the book Jeni’s Splendid Ice Creams at Home, from Jeni Britton Bauer’s famous shop in Columbus, OH. Her base is non-traditional and includes corn syrup, cornstarch, and cream cheese. Milk, heavy cream, and sugar are heated together with freshly shucked corn kernels as well as the spent corn cob. The base is thickened with cornstarch slurry, then strained, mixed with cream cheese, chilled, and spun in the ice cream maker. The ice cream is layered with a black raspberry syrup cooked down from fresh berries and sugar. Black raspberries are hard to source, and I substituted 1/2 blackberries and 1/2 raspberries instead. This is a really great and unexpected flavor combination and perfect to make in the summertime with fresh corn and berries.

Christina Tosi at Momofuku Milk Bar uses sheet gelatin to stabilize her ice cream base, and again no eggs are needed. I have made the Graham Ice Cream, and there are many other unique recipes in the Momofuku Milk Bar cookbook like Cereal Milk Ice Cream and Red Velvet Ice Cream. A little more complicated but worth doing for the unique flavors.

Finally, Joanne Chang’s Honey-Cinnamon Ice Cream, from her Flour cookbook, is really rich and sophisticated. It is made with a traditional custard ice cream base (heavy cream, egg yolks), with the delicious combination of honey and cinnamon. Really good paired with a fall dessert like her Roasted Pear and Cranberry Crostata.

Try an easy recipe or try a harder recipe, but hopefully you will be convinced to go out and make your own ice cream!

Share this:

Like this:

Related

3 thoughts on “Making Ice Cream at Home: A Primer”

Sadly my Kitchen-Aid ice cream bowl developed a crack and leaked blue goo all over my freezer and countertop. Hopefully my home repair job has saved it and I can try some of these delicious looking recipes!